Mullen It Over: From the Daily Star to the Daily Starting Price

From Tabloid Turf to Turf Management

So, after a recruitment process so long it could’ve qualified for pension credits, the Jockey Club has finally appointed a new group chief executive. And in a delicious twist of fate, they’ve picked a man whose career is part soap opera, part hostage note: Jim Mullen, former CEO of Ladbrokes Coral, then top boss at Reach plc, home of such cultural treasures as The Daily Star and articles titled “You Won’t Believe What This Pigeon Did in Barnsley”.

He now rides into Newmarket as the head honcho of British racing’s most powerful institution – an organisation that owns fifteen racecourses, an estate portfolio that makes the Crown Estate look like an allotment society, and a business model increasingly based on selling Prosecco in paper cups to hen dos in fascinator hats.

But what does Mullen’s arrival actually mean for racing? What future awaits the turf beneath the toffs? And why, once again, are we pretending bookmakers are benevolent partners when they’ve been bleeding the sport dry since decimalisation?

The Racing Estate: A National Treasure or Prime Real Estate?

Let’s start with the obvious. The Jockey Club, despite its branding as a not-for-profit bastion of British tradition, is sitting on a property portfolio so valuable it makes one wonder whether they run horses at Cheltenham just to distract from the fact they could sell it off to become the next Bicester Village.

The real question under Mullen’s leadership will be this:
Do the racecourses exist to host sport, or to make racing just commercially palatable enough to justify the asset value of the land they’re sitting on?

Because with prize money falling, attendances sagging, and Chelmsford on a Tuesday attracting fewer viewers than a ukulele tutorial on YouTube, the temptation to “reimagine” racecourse use will only grow. And by “reimagine”, of course, we mean “demolish, develop, and replace with luxury flats named after former winners.”

“Welcome to Desert Orchid Gardens – where heritage meets en-suites.”

Bookmakers: The Velvet Rope of Racing’s Decline

But if you’re looking for the true parasite in the paddock, don’t blame the Jockey Club entirely. No, direct your side-eye towards the bookmakers – those cheerful high-street money vacuums in corporate drag – who have long pretended to be the saviours of racing while actually functioning as its most efficient leech.

Jim Mullen, let’s remember, used to run Ladbrokes Coral – the betting conglomerate that has done more to erode public trust in racing than any dodgy stewarding decision or whip rule confusion ever could. And while he’s described as a “racing fan,” his old job was essentially monetising people's inability to calculate odds while making ads that suggested a fiver on the 3.30 at Wolverhampton was the height of masculinity.

Bookmakers talk a big game about “supporting the sport,” but let’s be honest – their contribution to racing is akin to the way seagulls “contribute” to seaside tourism. Yes, they’re ever-present. But mostly they just swoop in, make a mess, and take your chips.

They extract value by exploiting a peculiar mix of nostalgia and naivety – the punter’s hope that maybe, just maybe, this time the favourite won’t inexplicably finish fourth behind a 22/1 donkey from the wrong stable. And in return? A paltry levy payment. A few sponsored races. The occasional YouTube series with a pundit who says “each-way value” more often than his own child’s name.

The entire setup is a bit like having vampires sponsor the blood bank.

The Delicate Dance of Development and Decline

What Mullen now inherits is not just a business, but a national identity crisis in fancy dress. Racing is torn between its heritage – the roaring Cheltenham crowds, the Queen mum’s hat, the lovely daftness of it all – and the grim commercial reality that the world has moved on. The average under-30 doesn’t follow racing unless it involves a TikTok hamster running obstacle courses to Beethoven.

So what next? Will Mullen – with his publishing pedigree and gambling know-how – double down on digitising the race-day experience? Push for a more commercialised, betting-integrated, influencer-marketed racing brand? Possibly. But all of it will be for naught unless racing finally admits the biggest joke in the weighing room:

Bookmakers don’t give back – they take.

If racing keeps relying on the illusion of a mutually beneficial relationship with the betting giants, it’ll end up like a washed-up 80s rock band – still performing, still nostalgic, but financially dependent on an industry that’s already remixed their greatest hits into a ringtone.

Baroness Harding: From Test and Trace to Turf and Tracing Paper

And let’s not forget the incoming senior steward, Baroness Dido Harding, whose CV boasts “running NHS Test and Trace” – a phrase now mostly used in courtrooms and pub quizzes. Her arrival signals even more of the same: a kind of polite managerial optimism delivered through the prism of middle-class PR training and the sort of strategic thinking that once spent £37bn to discover that data entry is hard.

Harding says Mullen brings “a wealth of experience.” Which, in this context, reads less like an endorsement and more like a warning label.

Final Furlong: Betting the Farm or Saving the Sport?

So here we are. British racing stands at a crossroads, one muddy hoof in tradition, the other in TikTok. Jim Mullen, with his bookie’s background and publisher’s polish, is tasked with dragging this creaking machine into the future.

But to do that, the Jockey Club must finally confront a few uncomfortable truths:

• That racing is not yet “accessible,” it’s just easier to bet on than pronounce the names of the horses.

• That the estates it sits on might soon be worth more than the sport they host.

• And most crucially, that bookmakers are not partners – they are parasites, extracting billions while giving back scraps, all while convincing the public that this is the cost of tradition.

The future of racing won’t be decided at Cheltenham or Aintree. It’ll be decided in a boardroom, where someone will ask whether the 2:15 on a Wednesday is more profitable than a Costa drive-thru. And if the answer’s no? Well… don’t be surprised if your local racecourse soon gets planning permission for a Lidl and a yoga barn.

After all, the odds were always stacked.